


to die of love is to live by it

by purplefennels7



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Character Death, F/F, Sad Ending, amilyn's kamikaze, talking to ships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 12:55:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14402571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplefennels7/pseuds/purplefennels7
Summary: she isn’t going to let one more life be wasted, one more soul burn too bright and be snuffed out too fastamileia, kamikaze





	to die of love is to live by it

**Author's Note:**

> ey so I finally finished writing something and of course it's for a rarepair, but I had a really good time doing it so I hope y'all like it as much as I liked writing it  
> comments/kudos make my life  
> EDIT: NOW WITH AMAZING [COVER ART](https://phxsmas.tumblr.com/post/173276793971/billy-protectionsquad-is-the-best-human-on-the) BY [EM](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Em3kitty/pseuds/Em3kitty)

As she stares out at the dying light of the exploding transport, a single laser bolt from the  _ Supremacy _ wiping out however many lives rest in that fragile balance between vacuum and atmo, Amilyn knows that Leia’s out there.  She doesn’t know which transport Leia's on as she looks on from the wing of the bridge, but it might as well be all of them. She's looking out at the same sight and something is shattering inside her heart as she watches her people die. They both know that those transports are their last hope. The entirety of the Resistance, less than 400 men and women too young and too brave to die like this, resides on those helpless little ships.

And Amilyn’s just so suddenly angry.

She stalks over to the pilot’s chair, spinning it around with a rough toss of her hand, her vision blurring with tears. If she has to die anyway, why not go out protecting the woman she loves, and by extension their cause? She isn’t going to let one more life be wasted, one more soul burn too bright and be snuffed out too fast. She knows that her life is over either way. There’s no other way for this to end.

_ Damned if I do and damned if I don’t _ , she thinks. _ If I do nothing, we both die. If I do something, maybe I’ll die but Leia, Leia will survive this. _

She finds herself unconsciously clenching her jaw as she seats herself in the chair, its mechanical whir steeling her resolve as she steadies herself in front of the viewscreen. The tears are building in her eyes and her jaw’s twitching and she’s clenching her teeth to prevent herself from screaming, and her breaths are coming hard and fast and she’s at the edge of falling apart but she can’t. She’s got a duty to do, and she’ll do it even if hell freezes over.

But her hands shake as they play across the controls, and she pulls them away like she’s been burned, heart in her throat. There’s nothing worse she could do than hit the wrong switch at the wrong time; she’d go jetting across the universe with the last of her fuel and abandon the transports, abandon  _ Leia  _ to the wolves snapping at their heels. She’s already almost sure that people are staring out the windows of the transports, cursing her out for cowardice. Even though she’s tried to ignore the whispers, she could never get away from  _ traitor, coward, weakness, weakness, weakness. _ And now, in the moment that she could’ve proved them all wrong, all she’s doing is proving them right. She isn’t strong enough for this. She isn’t brave enough. She can’t even sacrifice herself right. 

She can’t stop now, though. She’s already started the ship turning, and there’s no going back. The minute the First Order figures out what she’s doing and she isn’t paying attention, she’s dead.

The light reflecting across the bridge of the _ Raddus _ catches her eye as the ship turns under her, and it reminds her of the time Leia took her to the observation deck and they just sat and watched the sun whirl over the walls, and Amilyn felt the tension leaving her shoulders for the first time in months. At that moment she’d known that they had finally found a place that they could escape from their duties and their anxieties for a few hours.

And her shaking hands still as if Leia’s are holding them steady, and as she swings the _ Raddus _ around and stares out her viewscreen at the knife-like form of the _ Supremacy _ hovering in front of her, the anger bubbles low and hot in her stomach. This is the ship that’s killing her friends, her family, this is the ship that’s blowing her transports out of the sky, this is the ship that might deliver Leia’s death sentence.

Amilyn places her hands back onto the controls and rigs the ship for lightspeed, and she doesn’t think she’s just imagining it when she feels hands atop her own, going through the familiar motions.  _ Leia, is that you? _ she wants to ask, but she doesn’t. Whatever force is guiding her shouldn’t suffer the ignominy of a name.

She places one hand atop the lever that’ll take her and her ship at flank speed into the exposed side of the  _ Supremacy _ , and stops. She sits back in her chair for a moment and stares out into the blackness of space. 

She’s doing this for Leia. She’s doing this so Leia can survive. There’s no hope left for her. 

The old mantra runs through her head again as she sits at the crossroads that it prophesied.  _ A captain cannot cheat death.  _ But she can help her general cheat it again. 

_ For Leia, for Leia, for Leia _ . It reverberates like a mantra in Amilyn’s mind and blocks out the sound of the  _ Raddus _ ’s low-fuel alarms and the repetitive chiming of the hyperspace lane warning.

Raddus _ , honey, pull through for me, okay? We’ll go down together, you and me, a blaze of glory for our General. _ Even in this moment, Amilyn can’t help but talk to her ship. She’s had the habit since the very first time she climbed into an X-wing and felt the thrumming of the engine beneath her, and the fighter had seemed almost alive as they’d leapt out of the hangar. She still remembers each and every one of her ships, still has a special bond with each, and she can’t bear to confront the crushing loneliness that comes with the knowledge that  _ Raddus _ will be her last. 

Her ship, somehow, seems to know what she’s thinking. The alarms don’t go quiet, but Amilyn imagines she can feel  _ Raddus _ closing tight around her, steeling herself for their last fight just as Amilyn is. She tightens her hands on the arms of her chair, holding on in the only way she knows how.

She reaches out again, and her fingers close on the lever, painted nails gleaming in the dying light. Not a moment too soon, the tracks of homing missiles etch themselves across the blackness of space, and she only hesitates for a moment before she pushes forwards. Her last thought as the stars blur into streaks and the whine of the hyperdrive fills the cabin is _ Leia, Leia, Leia. _

**Author's Note:**

> if you wanna scream about star wars my tumblr is [@phxsmas](https://phxsmas.tumblr.com)


End file.
